Fic: Friday On My Mind.
My very first Heroes fic. *is proud* For the heroes_exchange comm.
Title: Friday On My Mind
Recipient: blueskypenguin
Characters/Pairings: Sylar/Peter
Rating: NC-17
Wordcount: 8287
Spoilers: Up to Duel, Clear and Present Danger, Shades of Grey
Warnings: Rude words and mild violence. Slash
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to Tim Kring, NBC et al
A/N: Many thanks to CelsieRan for the great Beta. She is not a net girl or even a Heroes fan. But a more vicious grammar queen has never been born. Anything left is my fault alone as I couldn't stop tweaking til the very end. Thanks Cel.
Summary: Peter tries to understand why Sylar keeps breaking into his apartment. Sylar would like to know as well.
Friday On My Mind.
Peter un-wrapped the blood-pressure cuff from around his patient’s arm and offered a reassuring smile to her worried husband. This close to Christmas the mall was filled to bursting with shoppers all exuding seasonal cheer as they tried to ram their shopping carts into spaces far too small to accommodate them. Helen had been caught between a frantic family of six and a pile of discount DVD players when she’d collapsed with an angina attack. David, her husband had called for help and now Peter was checking to make sure Helen could be with her family for Christmas. She has three daughters in Tulsa and does Peter have a number she can contact him on? Just in case her heart starts acting up again?
“You can call emergency anytime Helen,” Peter assures her gently. Fingers ghosting over the equipment in his kit, counting and checking to make sure he isn’t leaving something dangerous behind. Deliberately ignoring Mitchell’s wide grin, Peter chats a little more about big family Christmas dinners that need to be cooked and how rude everyone is this time of year before being engulfed in a warm, coffee smelling hug.
Mitchell is vibrating with laughter as they head back to their bus, the multitude moving out of their way in an unconscious respect for their uniforms.
“Stop it,” Peter orders with a faint blush.
“She would have proposed right there on the floor if her husband wasn’t standing behind you.” The bulky red-head teases, opening the ambulance door and climbing in. “Although I think he was just as smitten, maybe they wouldn’t introduce you to their daughters after all…”
“You are so funny Mitch, I’m gonna need to give myself a shot just to calm down.” Peter swings into the driver’s seat and contemplates leaving Mitchell behind in the vehicular push and shove of the car park.
The red-head settles in beside Peter. “You’re just too nice you know Petey-Pete? They tell you all about their lives and you eat it up like it’s the most interesting thing in the world. You got to keep some distance you know? You’ll burn out from feeling too much otherwise.”
“Maybe.” But Peter is non-committal. He genuinely likes talking to people, hearing their stories, getting to know them. After the crazed drama that has been his life for the past year, it’s a nice change to relate to normal people with normal lives.
As for burning out…been there, done that.
******
For Peter, Friday afternoon shift finishes at 8pm, allowing just enough time to get home, find something to eat and crash into bed. He has Saturdays off for the next six months and usually gets up early to make the most of his free time. Flicking his locks into place as he checks the mail, Peter tosses his keys onto the kitchen counter and opens the fridge. Eyeing some left-over pizza dubiously, Peter thinks he should call Clair to see what she is doing while visiting his mother, they could have dinner at….
Very, very slowly Peter closed the fridge door, his heart beginning to pound like poor Helen’s.
“Hello Peter.”
Deep velvet voice that causes a shiver of both excitement and fear to race along his nerves.
Turning carefully, Peter looks searchingly around the living room of his apartment until he spots a pocket of shadows beside the door to his bedroom. Something glints in the light from the kitchen.
“Sylar,” he breathes.
The shadows move and he can see black clad shoulders, some kind of long coat, and the slightly paler black of skin at around face height. Peter glances at his door, how many feet is it from where he’s standing…or maybe…?
“You’ll never make it.” Staggering confidence.
Peter bristles; he’s fought the killer to standstill and kicked his ass again at Primatech.
But that was before.
Taking a long breath, Peter breaks and runs. All his fear and adrenaline channelled into a desperate sprint. But not for the door…for the window.
He almost makes it. Shoulders curled in to take the impact of the glass, Peter sees a splash of yellow from headlights in the street below, just as a telekinetic band encircles his waist and he is wrenched backwards. Flat on the floor, Peter pushes and twists but he knows it’s hopeless. The casual strength of Sylar’s favourite power is horribly familiar to him, an almost citrus flavour to the press and crush of a killer’s will.
Refusing to fight anymore, he lays still and concentrates on keeping his fear under control.
Ominous footsteps across his polished floorboards and then Gabriel Grey looms over him, his height magnified by Peter’s supine position. Expecting either a razor pain on his forehead or a full body teke press, Peter is surprised when Sylar sinks down to sit cross-legged beside him, resting elbows on knees and giving the pinned nurse a once-over.
“Claire stabbed me in the head with a piece of glass…I thought of you.”
The light from the kitchen reveals Sylar’s compelling face, strong brow currently furrowed in thought, black stubbled jaw and a wide neat mouth that under any other circumstances Peter would have considered intensely attractive. Of course ‘other circumstances’ also assumes that the face’s owner isn’t about to butcher him on his new rug.
“She mentioned it.” Not glass, anything but glass. What do you do with something that killed you? Peter didn’t want to die at all, but having shards of glass near him during his work is beyond uncomfortable, glass and Sylar in the same room is terrifying. “How did you..?”
“Fire melted it; lovely feeling it was too, healing fourth degree burns. But you know what that’s like don’t you Peter?” Sylar always laces his name with a resonant curl, like he tastes it every time he shapes the letters with his lips.
Wondering why he is asking questions of the psycho killer, Peter notices for the first time that he isn’t held to the floor by a huge palm of power but more like a bug skewered by a needle. Only his hips and back are anchored; arms, legs and shoulders are free to move. Peter keeps himself as still as possible despite this as he isn’t sure if the lack of pressure is deliberate or an oversight on the other’s part.
“Why did you run toward the window Peter?”
Gaze locking with Sylar’s bitter chocolate eyes, Peter bites his tongue.
“Because your fire escape isn’t the most secure in the world,” Sylar continues thoughtfully. “Why wouldn’t you try for the door? Hmmm, and you were running so fast….Peter?” A sing-song lilt has entered the velvet voice as thoughts whirl and connect behind the killer’s eyes.
“Were you going to fly Peter?”
Shit, shit, shit. Should have gone for the door. Peter thinks desperately, “Only one lock on the…”
“You’re ly-ing.” Now the telekinesis crawls up his chest to gently encircle his throat. “You have a power, you can fly can’t you Peter?” Unmistakable glee.
Now Peter begins to fight, kicking and pushing against the invisible force, reaching for Sylar. If he can just touch…
“Now don’t be like that Peter.” Sylar leans forward and whispers so close to Peter’s ear he wonders if he can copy a power by that minimal contact. “I would love to fly, but I don’t want to take the risk. I didn’t come to kill you and now that you’re back among us with gifts well...” a pause while Peter fights an involuntary shiver at the warm breath caressing the sensitive skin near his hairline. “…I’m still not going to kill you. Good bye Peter.”
Standing in one long graceful movement, Gabriel Grey walks to the window, heavy boots reverberating to where Peter lays trapped on the floor.
“You should eat more. Svelte is perfect on you, skinny is not.”
Peter watches for long seconds after the window closes behind the killer, slowly sitting up when the telekinetic hold finally disappears.
“The fuck?”
*****
The following Friday is foretelling a particularly nasty winter ahead. Grey skies and a chill wind serve to throw everyone’s karma into chaos, causing more brawls and accidents in one day than in the last month combined. Peter finishes dressing after a long hot shower and is wandering towards his kitchen when he notices a shadow on his fire escape. Holding still, he looks harder and determines that yes, indeed, there is a man sitting on his fire escape landing.
In October.
In the cold.
Wishing he could be the kind of person to just drop the blinds and go on with his evening, Peter slides up the glass and leans against the white window frame. Chances are better for him exposed to the open sky anyway and it’s not as if the guy couldn’t have just barged in like he had the previous week.
“Should I even ask?” He questions as goose bumps not entirely from the cold pebble his skin.
In the light from Peter’s apartment, Sylar looks relaxed, elbows on raised knees, head resting comfortably against the cold iron of the hand rail. A polite smile graces the serial killer’s lips as midnight eyes wander over Peter’s form.
“You were a little bit upset last time I came in without an invitation, so…” The smile takes on a taunting edge as Peter processes the concept of being ‘a little bit upset’ about last week’s home invasion.
“So you decided to linger outside my window in the freezing cold instead?” He can’t keep the disbelief out of his voice, because there is no way in hell Sylar is actually being considerate of Peter’s personal space.
Sylar shrugs with an inherent grace Peter is suddenly fiercely envious of. How dare such an attractive creature be such a monster? If his heart-rate wasn’t climbing with slow-crawling fear, it would likely being doing it from proximity to the dark clad man anyway. Crossing his arms, Peter starts to rub them to create some warmth and to banish the chill of fear as well as desire.
Dark eyes watch the movement, long fingers flick suddenly and Peter stiffens in surprise. But the citrus caress of power doesn’t touch him; instead he feels a gentle thump as his winter coat, discarded onto his sofa earlier lands across his shoulders.
“In or out Peter, you’re letting the warmth go, hovering there like a nervous colt.” The smile is gone and dark eyes look away from Peter, down the alley towards the lights of the traffic beyond.
Pushing his arms into the sleeves, Peter climbs through the window. Unable to hide his caution he avoids being too close and settles down with his back against the brick of his building, sock-clad feet near Sylar’s big boots but not touching. Crossing his arms tightly he feels the cold creep into the fabric of his jeans and wonders what the hell is going on.
In a frightening display of intuition that Peter would suspect is telepathy if Matt hadn’t called him this morning, Sylar answers Peter’s thought.
“When Angela told me I was your brother I thought I had finally found a reason for being.” The words are clear; unemotional even delivered in velvet beauty. “A family to be a part of, parents I could respect, brothers to share the world with.”
Peter clenches his teeth against a sudden burst of disgust. His mother had certainly used a very powerful weapon against the man next to him, the lure of family to control someone who is essentially uncontrollable.
“A family that spends more time fighting than sharing Sylar.” He corrects sharply, unwilling to hear praise of the flawed ensemble. “We yell and snipe, insult and interfere in each others lives. Petrelli is Italian for manipulate you know. You met my father.”
‘And killed him with me.’ Peter’s conscience supplies ruthlessly.
Sylar looks back at the bitterness lacing Peter’s words. “I would have fit right in then, wouldn’t I?”
Peter ignores the question. “I never thought you were my brother. Mom could rival Lindeman for pulling strings, but she is ferociously protective of us. She keeps trying to steal Claire away to Europe to keep her safe.” A fond smile rises to his lips at the thought of his adored niece. “There is no way she would let Dad take away a child of hers...no way.”
Looking over, Peter catches Sylar staring at his mouth and ducks his head self-consciously. Lately he’s rarely bothered with his appearance and it’s unsettling to feel aware like this with Sylar the Crazed Murderer for God’s sake. Sternly ordering himself to get a grip, Peter sneaks a glance and finds another smile crossing the strong handsome features.
“I’m glad now that we’re not brothers Peter.” The velvet voice goes a seductive tone deeper. “Let’s just say that brotherly feelings would have been a poor substitute for what’s between us.”
Peter blinked. “Blood, death and violence you mean?”
Gabriel Gray laughs out loud. A gorgeous shock of sound that moves blood from Peter’s extremities to other vital areas and echoes delightfully down to the street below.
“Maybe,” chuckling, Sylar rises to his feet in one fluid movement and Peter scrambles up so that he can’t be loomed over. Not anymore than normal anyway. A warm hand catches his elbow and steadies him. Stunned Peter doesn’t even think to flinch away.
“But not anymore, I haven’t wanted to kill you in, well…it’s been months Peter.”
It has been. Peter was the one responsible for most of the aggression in their recent encounters.
“Going to fly?” The question seems innocent, until Peter looks into midnight eyes seeing a feral light deep within.
“I never said I could fly.”
Fingers dropping from Peter’s arm, Gabriel steps back, face suddenly closed, eyes going hard.
Peter regrets the words, but…
“It’s too cold anyway.” He confesses, looking back into the warmth of his apartment, then glancing up to see triumph light the taller man’s features.
“Stay warm Peter.” A hand reaches forward and Peter holds still as long, strong fingers twitch the collar of his coat into place then caress down his arm and wrist.
Peter sways forward at the touch, only to find Sylar rising up, the scent of citrus in the air as powerful telekinesis lifts him up to the roof and away.
Shivering from a combination of cold and several other feelings, Peter climbs back in his window. Everything Sylar said was twined with some other meaning that Peter will review again and again until he can understand what is going through the killer’s mind.
Why was he visiting Peter without intention of violence? Why linger in his home, then the next week hover outside his window in the chill of late fall?
What is going on?
*****
Waking slowly to the delicious feel of cool clean sheets, Peter sighs in the bliss a shift-worker feels when realising he doesn’t have to go back to work for hours yet. Thursday evening is assigned as apartment cleaning time and fresh laundered linen rustles gently as Peter stretches and curls his toes in smooth cotton. Cracking an eyelid he notices that it’s well past sunrise and he should probably be doing something useful before his shift, but given he had two fatalities in the last 36 hours he decides that he deserves to be lazy for a change.
Rolling onto his stomach, Peter rubs a pesky itch on his nose into the pillow before settling in for another long sleep. Opening his eyes to check the time on his alarm clock, Peter’s breathe freezes in his throat with sudden agonising fright as he sees Sylar lying beside him on the bed.
Sylar lying beside him on the bed.
Gabriel Grey, clothed in his typical midnight attire, booted feet crossed at the ankles, chin in hand as he causally watches Peter die of shock right in front of him.
Sylar in his bed.
Sylar. In. His. Fucking. Bed!!
With an sharp indrawn breath that scalds his throat, Peter rears back from the serial killer in his bed, and stumbles to the floor then to the wall before regaining full control of his limbs and accelerated heart rate.
“What the…? You can’t just…Get out you maniac!” Ignoring in the fact that he sounds hysterical, Peter manages to summon a truly massive glare and aims it directly at his unwelcome visitor.
What can only be described as a smirk graces Sylar’s lips, dark eyes wandering from Peter’s naked feet, up his pyjama clad legs and bare chest to the tangled mess of his hair. If Peter didn’t know any better he would swear the killer had just checked him out. A shiver trails down his spine at the idea.
“You just run through every emotion on high speed don’t you Peter?” Sylar does the complete opposite of Peter’s demand and sprawls across the bed, head on the pillow Peter just vacated, feet almost reaching over the far edge. Resting his cheek on the slightly dented cotton, Gabriel sends a wicked look at Peter through his lashes as he takes a long deep breath in through his nose.
In a re-run of last week’s emotional shock, Peter realises he can’t force Sylar to do anything. Standing three feet away and giving orders is about as effective as stamping his foot and probably just as humiliating. Turning on his heel Peter snatches a long-sleeved t-shirt off his cabinet and heads for the kitchen. Sylar may get his kicks out of invading other people’s privacy, doesn’t mean Peter has to stand here and watch him.
Only a few minutes later, Peter is staring thoughtfully at two mugs on his kitchen counter as footsteps precede his guest into the kitchen. Not even looking away from the boiling kettle, Peter asks,
“Are you going to kill me?”
The scrape of one of his chairs being pulled out from the breakfast nook.
“Not today Peter.” Sylar’s dark velvet voice is magnified in its beauty by Peter being unable to see the man.
“Hurt or threaten me? Wreck my stuff? Make me late for work?”
“No Peter. Should I promise?” A thread of amusement sprinkled through the velvet now. Peter suppresses an answering smile. Turning around he gestures to the steaming mugs in front of him.
“Coffee then?” He knows he sounds wary and why not? He’s entertaining a murderer.
Something that could only be called surprise crosses Sylar’s strong features, brows arched suddenly, lips parting in a way that Peter argues with himself isn’t as appealing as it looks.
“Yes. Thank you.” Manners that must have been ingrained since birth come to the fore and Peter winces at the courtesy shown him.
This is getting just a bit surreal.
A bit?
Taking a long drink of his own wickedly black coffee, Peter watches the other man as colliding emotions finally come to an accord. Sylar isn’t going to hurt him. Hasn’t laid a finger on him in their last half-dozen or so meetings and actively helped him during the chaos of Pinehurst. So what the fuck does that mean? Peter just can’t really maintain fear of the man anymore and that is likely a dangerous, dangerous thing.
Sylar coughs uncomfortably and Peter realises he must have been staring at the man’s mouth while he was drinking. Hoping to God his cheeks aren’t colouring, Peter drags his eyes upwards and sees Sylar looking away, gazing out the window as he toys with the small chip in the mug’s handle.
What the hell was Gabriel Grey doing here? That he would break in and ruthlessly impose himself, then feel uncomfortable with basic hospitality?
Peter has to find out.
“Please understand I’m not going to hurt you,” he reassures Sylar, setting his cup aside and straightening from a slouch on the bench.
“What?” Head snapping back to him, Sylar’s gaze becomes sharp, standing so quickly the cup spins a moment on the counter. “You can’t hurt me Peter; I thought we’d established that.”
Somehow he holds his ground when Sylar steps closer, using his height to loom in a way that Peter, now his fear has abated, finds really, really irritating. Tossing his head a little to keep the hair out of his eyes, Peter looks up those few important inches and replies,
“I know it won’t last, but I remember when I had Claire’s ability and I’ve got a few hours at least…” words cut off as long fingers grab his upper arms in a crushing grip that will leave bruises later no doubt.
“What won’t last Peter? What have you…?” That ferocious intelligence clinks into place, bitter chocolate eyes find the coffee mug on the breakfast nook and return to Peter full of accusation. For some reason he can’t explain, Peter’s gut churns with guilt.
“I’m sorry, but I have to know what’s going on with you….”
Fingers gone from his skin, Sylar turns too fast and stumbles against the door frame as he makes for the living room.
“I promise I won’t let you be hurt.” Peter vows as he follows the staggering villain. “I promise.”
When Sylar finally collapses just shy of the front door, Peter crouches down beside him and carefully checks his pulse. Strong and steady. Not entirely confident he has as many hours as he would like, Peter snatches up the phone and wonders how he’s going to get the bigger man off his floor.
*****
Two hours later, Peter has clean teeth, neat hair, an ex-cop and a geneticist in his living room.
Oh and a drugged up serial killer.
“Peter I cannot tell you how dangerous this is. We should call Noah and let him take care of everything.” Mohinder reminds him with his gentle intensity. It’s fairly decent of the man to even be helping them considering the immense hatred the scientist feels for Sylar.
“I know Mohinder, but there is something going on with Sylar and I need to know what it is.” Peter had called in his reinforcements as soon as he was sure the killer was out cold. Matt had agreed in a heartbeat, Mohinder tagging along because if it involved Gabriel Grey then it involved him. “Besides, Bennet is retired, doesn’t even have anywhere to keep him now. I don’t even know if anyone can hold Sylar with all the powers he has.”
“You caught him,” Matt tells Peter, adjusting and checking the weapons, all but one of which will be useless if everything doesn’t go according to plan.
“Yeah.” Peter can’t even explain why he feels so bad about that. Maybe the expression on Sylar’s face when Peter had offered the coffee, like he’d never had anyone make him a drink before.
Shoving his feelings aside to be examined at excruciating length later, Peter takes his position just behind Matt’s shoulder and readies the syringe in his hand. Mohinder stands behind the chair Peter has hauled the killer into, long-bladed hunting knife inches from Sylar’s skull, ready in case everything goes to hell.
As it probably will.
“Okay, in I go.” Matt declares and sits forward in his seat directly in front of Sylar. It’s a credit to his immense courage that when Peter asked him to telepathically enter a serial killer’s mind there was only three seconds of hesitation. That and the promise of a tranquiliser in the bicep if Matt starts freaking out and trying to kill anyone.
For Peter it only takes about ten minutes. His own experience with Matt’s power is one of simple influence rather than scanning so he has no idea how much time passes for Matt and Sylar, but from the way Matt keeps leaning forward and Sylar’s occasional jolts, it isn’t quick or pleasant.
“Peter?” Mohinder’s knuckles have gone white around the knife handle.
“Just a little more time Mohinder, Matt said he’d come out and give us an update, just wait till then. Please?” What would he do if Mohinder tried to stab Sylar…stop him? God Peter what the fuck have got yourself into?
“Whoa, that hurts,” Matt growls, leaning back and releasing Sylar from his mental attack.
“Matt?” Mohinder’s voice reveals his stress.
“No, no Mohinder I’m fine. Don’t do it yet.” Rubbing his face hard with both hands, Matt looks up at Peter. ”You’re right, there is something very wrong in his mind, but I don’t know if it’s a new kind of wrong or if he’s always been this way.”
“Can you heal it?” Peter keeps his emotions firmly under wraps.
“I don’t know...maybe.” Matt looks thoughtfully back at the slumped figure in front of him.
Mohinder shakes his head in the negative. “It’s too risky. This whole idea is insane.”
“I know Mohinder,” Peter agrees, it isn’t Matt he has to convince, it’s the doctor. “But right now we only have one way of stopping him, “ a gesture towards the huge blade in Mohinder’s hand. “If Matt can do anything to heal Sylar from the inside, then stabbing a man in the head isn’t necessary.”
“He killed you.” The words are stark in their truth.
Peter tastes the memory of blood in his mouth. “I know.”
“I watched him do it. I carried your body to your mother and witnessed her face when she saw you. He killed my father and over a dozen others, he doesn’t deserve to be helped Peter.”
No, he doesn’t. “You’re right…I…”
“I’ll do it.” Matt takes the argument away from them both.
“Matt please...” Mohinder begins.
But the stocky policeman holds up his hand. “I saw more of his victims than either of you and I know what he did to each and every one of them. I have a chance to fix this, to repair whatever damaged this man and I’m going to take it.” Even Mohinder closes his mouth at the tone of promise coming from Matt. “But keep those ready just in case.”
A last lingering look into Mohinder’s eyes and then Matt puts his concentration squarely into the battle for a man’s sanity.
Only a moment or two later Sylar starts to jerk, his whole body reacting to Matt’s attempt at healing.
“Come back here Gabriel, don’t run.” Matt mutters under his breath. “You don’t need to fix them all, you know how they work now.”
“Get out.” Slurred from the unconscious man’s lips.
“Matt, he’s waking up.” Peter warns, finger’s tightening on the needle.
“You already know why…not your parents, you didn’t need to…it isn’t broken.” Matt’s one sided conversation continues.
Long fingers, once relaxed, suddenly fist and all the books in Peter’s apartment fall to the floor.
“I know he’s not broken…you can’t…ahhh, there it is…almost….but it’s so simple Gabriel you could…”
A full-body flinch and doors rip off their hinges, hang suspended in midair like balloons.
“…Gabriel…you only get to have him if you fix the problem…the hunger is the problem….”
Sylar’s head lifts, his eyes open and fix on Matt’s face.
Mohinder pulls his arm back, blade catching the sunlight and refracting a thousand times across the room.
“…Gabriel it’s broken…FIX IT!” Matt’s command echoes through all their heads as Sylar stands up, eyes blazing with fury. Matt, returned to the present, is flung across the room, Mohinder pressed with equal force to the wall behind him.
A single flick of the hand and the hypodermic in Peter’s fingers is embedded in a nearby floating door. The citrus thrill of Sylar’s telekinesis catches his throat and lifts him with careless ease. Tugged up and forward until they are nose to nose, Peter claws at his strangled neck.
“Oh I’m going to punish you for this Peter.” The once-velvet voice is raw with murderous intent.
Peter gasps in enough air for a few words. “Did…you… do… it? Fix…it?”
A slight head tilt as the killer looks inwardly for a moment. Midnight eyes widen.
“What did you do?” But the invisible grip had robbed Peter of air; the world goes smudgy around the edges.
“Whatever you did, I’m going to come back and make you pay. Very. Slowly.” The threat is whispered against his lips. Peter hears it just before the world goes grey and all is swallowed in the sound of shattering glass.
******
Four weeks later, Peter closes the door behind his guest and almost nervously crosses to his kitchen. Pulling down two coffee mugs he flicks on the kettle and pastes on a smile for the other man.
“Nice place Pete, you live here long?” Tom stands at ease near Peter’s book shelf, looking at the small items that make up one man’s life, probably wondering what they each represent.
Shrugging, Peter makes coffee and forces his mind away from the memory of the last time he’d made hot drinks for two. “A few years.”
Now that he has Tom back to his home, he feels unaccountably shy. The cop had asked him out months ago, but Peter hadn’t accepted till recently. Hadn’t even thought about seeing anyone while the threat of Sylar’s return lingered in his thoughts. The first Friday after what Peter now terms the Cosmic Matt Telepathy Fuck Up, he’d had Noah Bennet stationed on his couch with several deadly firearms and many, many sharp pieces of metal. It had come to nothing.
Sylar hadn’t showed.
Embarrassed but relieved, Peter had thanked a disappointed Bennet and then survived a fraught week of paranoia until the bespectacled man had returned unasked the following Thursday. Still no sign of the serial killer and Peter felt his fear recede. Now filled with more information about guns than he ever wants to know, Peter has resumed his normal schedule and accepted Tom the Cop’s invitation to dinner.
Sylar had probably lost whatever weird interest he’d had in the nurse anyway and was off terrorising some other part of the country. Of course that meant Peter is smote with guilt about letting the man go free when he could have ended him. But that guilt is useful in smothering a smaller one regarding certain hotly inappropriate thoughts about the touch of Sylar’s lips and the look of intent in his eyes during their last encounter.
Tom, funny, tall, blond and built, was a gorgeous alternative to Peter’s right hand and the fading scent of a serial killer on his pillow. An option that would move to an even better level of distraction if they could get through coffee without Peter freaking out or calling the other man Gabriel by accident.
Fingers tickling down his ribs knocks Peter from his thoughts, bringing him back to the very real, very nice man in his apartment.
“Show me your bedroom?” Gentle words whisper into his ear, lips touch Peter’s neck in small, soft kisses. “Please?”
Turning into the circle of the other man’s arms, Peter leans up and kisses Tom, eyes closing on the handsome friendly face.
The wrong face.
Just as Peter deepens the kiss, opening his mouth to a courteous tongue, Tom’s mouth is…gone. Hands that had been lingering on Peter’s ass pull away so violently he staggers forward with their momentum.
Shocked, Peter looks up into the brilliant midnight eyes of Sylar and feels his heart freeze in his chest.
“I’m going to kill him now Peter and you get to watch.” Smokey velvet voice promising horror as Peter throws himself in front of Sylar and catches sight of…god...no...Tom’s spread eagled form telekinetically pinned to his ceiling.
“You are not going to hurt him you nutcase.” Peter rages, stupidly jumping, trying to reach the poor man above him. Tom’s eyes are wide with terror and disbelief. “Let him down Sylar, he’s a fucking cop!”
Sylar stands unmoving, rage filled eyes on Peter.
“A cop? That just shows your appalling physiological need for an authority figure Peter. Why didn’t you fuck Parkman if you needed someone with a badge.” Scorn infuses every word, spilling into the room and staining Peter with its lash.
Giving up on the jumping as useless, Peter strides directly into Sylar’s space and snarls in his face.
“First, don’t even think about judging my emotional issues Mr Unbalanced Freak, second, who I fuck is so very much none of your business, third, Matt’s with Mohinder as if you didn’t know and fourth, let him the fuck down now before I…”
Tom shoots Sylar in the head.
Stunned and slightly deafened from the sound, Peter looks up from the killer’s body to see his almost-boyfriend come crashing to the floor, gun held in a sure grip. In a bizarre thought Peter realises that it would have to have been an awesome shot from the ceiling at that angle.
Helping the policeman to stand, he hurries, “You have to leave Tom, he’s going to get up in a minute.”
A warm hand cups Peter’s shoulder, “He’s dead Pete, he’s not getting up. I’ll call it in…” Concerned blue eyes, still touched by fear gaze into his, then widen comically as they look beyond him. Peter can sympathise, Claire’s gift is one hell of a showstopper.
He whirls around and faces Sylar directly, keeping his body between the two men. Hopefully Tom won’t panic and shoot him in the back by accident.
Gabriel spits out the bullet that had shattered his cheekbone and drops it on the floor.
“Cute.” Peter acknowledges sassily. “Now get out Sylar, before a million cops come to check that gunshot.”
Sylar straightens to his full height and glares at Tom. “No.”
The click of a safety causes a tingle between Peter’s shoulder-blades. Crap. This will get even bloodier if he doesn’t get rid of one of them. Turning he catches Tom’s gun hand and lowers it to point the weapon at the floor.
“What the fuck is he Pete…?” The tremble in the cop’s voice is very real and suddenly Peter feels like shit.
“Tom, please. He’s an old…friend, and he…just…you need to leave.” What the hell can he say to get a very noble, very decent man to leave him alone with an undead felon? “I can handle it, I promise, I…”
Sylar takes over Peter’s deteriorating argument.
“Go home Tom the Cop. Go home feeling drunk and nauseous and call in sick tomorrow.” The deep velvet of Sylar’s voice takes on a strange resonance that makes Peter’s teeth itch. “This night never happened, you never took Peter out, you never touched him and if you even look at him again I’ll remove your balls and force them down your throat.”
Peter blinks at Tom’s dreamy blue eyes and slack mouth. “What are…?”
“Okay.” The blond nods helpfully before holstering his weapon and turning to the door.
“Tom!” Peter calls, catching the other man by the arm and looking him in the eye. But Tom looks straight through him, eyes turning to Sylar with a slight wince. Letting go, Peter backs away and watches a good man leave his apartment without a backward glance.
Turning around he glares all his anger at someone who is in no way a good man.
“Who did you kill for that one?” He doesn’t own the disappointment that laces his voice. Ridiculous to have hoped that Matt was successful all those weeks ago, but still he had wanted to believe.
“My father.” Peter blinks in surprise. “Right after I pulled out the arrows he shot into me, I decided that killing him was good for society as well as for me.”
Appalled, Peter just stares at the other man before his anger comes rushing back like a hurricane.
“Get out.” He hisses.
Fury that equals his own rises into midnight eyes.
“Make me.” Sylar responds, something delicious and deadly in his tone.
“Fine.” Peter turns sharply on his heel and makes to follow Tom. Hand on the lock he is caught by the waist, spun and lifted, back forced hard to the door with a very tall, very angry Gabriel Grey pressed full length to his body. Fury fuelled now by instant desire, Peter draws in a sharp, painful breath and rakes his fingers through Sylar’s thick dark hair, pulling two harsh handfuls, nearly scalping the man.
Sylar retaliates, a strong hand grabbing the back of Peter’s neck, tilting his head to the left as the killer leans inexorably forward. Dark strands catch under Peter’s fingernails as he squirms, the small pain unnoticed by Sylar’s relentless intent. Soft lips trace along his collarbone and throat, leaving aching heat in their wake and Peter’s fingers relax their death grip. The beginning of a moan works its way from Peter’s lungs.
Then Gabriel bites down…hard.
Back arching at the sudden pain, Peter’s moan turns into a grunt and he rams a thumb into Sylar’s eye socket.
“That’s why I like you so much Peter,” Sylar grits out as his bruised and damaged eye quickly heals. “I want to kill you almost as much as I want to…”
This time the stiff fingers hit him in the larynx and Peter suddenly feels a burst of citrus energy as telekineses takes over holding him to the door, while long fingers claw at a useless windpipe. Gabriel still has denim clad thighs pressed between Peter’s legs and one hand on his hip, but the weight of his body has shifted backwards.
“I don’t care what you want.” Peter states, refusing to fight the teke, refusing to give Sylar the satisfaction of seeing him struggle.
“Liar.” It’s gasped and small, but clear.
Peter looks into pained midnight eyes and feels his anger boil over. Anger at this situation, anger at Tom for leaving, anger at Sylar for being a murderer and most of all anger at himself for almost not caring, for being hard as rock at the touch of Gabriel’s body on his. For the deep, entrenched passion he feels even though it shocks his soul every time. He wants, needs and lusts over the very antithesis of his being and Peter feels impossible rage at himself for being so weak.
Grabbing two handfuls of heavy black woollen coat, Peter pulls Sylar forward and forces a kiss. Angry, harsh he feels soft lips tear under his teeth, taste of copper on his tongue before the small wound closes. Peter lets his rage fuel the touch, sends all that passion forwards until his mind clears and he becomes aware of what he’s doing.
Sylar stands completely still, unresponsive.
Then…
…the smell of citrus. Telekinesis rising like a great wave, building around them until Peter can perceive it even with his eyes half-closed. Almost smothered by the weight of power, a pressing intent of such strength curling like a long sinuous ribbon around Peter’s hands and arms.
Sylar strikes.
Hands all over Peter, moving continuously from shoulder to flank, body crowding him further into the unrelenting wood of the door. And Sylar’s lips, not just returning the kiss but…owning Peter’s mouth, consuming him with heat and wet, tongue tracing his teeth until Peter feels the hot pulse of release begin to coarse from his chest to his toes and back up. The blood carrying fire to where his cock is trapped against an equally interested partner, denim and cloth unlovely friction as Sylar’s hips rock into his.
One roaming hand catches under Peter’s knee and lifts it high over Sylar’s hip, while the other slides down the back of his pants, helpfully unbuckling themselves to allow the movement. Long fingers curve over Peter’s ass, cupping and holding him in place.
Feeling the hard grind, Peter arches his back, meeting Sylar’s thrust and tightening his fingers on black lapels, holding on under the relentless adoration of Sylar’s passion.
The need rises faster as Peter wrenches his head back to gasp in a vital breath and Sylar descends to his neck biting again and again. Tipping his face to allow more, Peter looks up at his ceiling, craving more contact, more pressure on his cock, more heat, more touch, more everything.
Sudden blinding frisson of shock. Peter feels his body flood with power, nothing sexual in it at all.
He stares numbly at his bare hand curled once again in thick dark hair.
Gabriel has stopping moving; body a taut bowstring as realisation dawns. His head lifts and as midnight eyes lock onto Peter’s he knows that explanations just aren’t going to cut it.
“Sorry.” Peter gasps at last.
Sylar’s eyes widen from curiosity to abject disbelief as he is flung across the room and out the window. Stolen powers flare as the glass slams back into place, Peter lands on his feet and the bites on his neck begin to heal.
“Sorry.” Peter repeats quietly as he watches Elle’s electricity flicker across his fingers.
*****
Peter leans back against the door and lets his keys dangle from his fingers. He hadn’t been sure what to expect, driving home from work tonight. After last Friday’s encounter he felt sure that if Gabriel returned it would be as an aggressor rather than a suitor. Sylar was not the kind of man who would tolerate his powers being copied, particularly not by Peter.
So, the gentle clink of metal is the only sound in his apartment as Peter looks at the intruder on his couch. Long legs crossed at the ankle, head comfortably pillowed on a cushion braced against the sofa arm, Gabriel looks as relaxed as Peter has ever seen him.
It looks like he’s been there for hours.
“I talked to a friend of mine about you.” The reclining man offers as if they were continuing a conversation after only a moment’s pause rather than the seven day hiatus that had actually occurred.
Biting back a comment about Sylar even having a ‘friend’ as beneath him, Peter shrugs off his coat and edges slowly into the room. He knows that last week was a lone success, if it comes to a battle with Sylar’s abilities, Peter is confident in the other’s victory.
“You did?” Curious and uncertain of the killer’s mood.
Sylar, gaze on the ceiling, nods. Peter ignores the slight ruffle in the usually pristine hair style and his fingers itchy need to touch.
“He’s just a teenager, but he has a certain way of putting things that I can relate to.” The velvet voice is low and even, like he’s discussing the whether. Peter quietly puts his satchel and keys on the counter.
“His advice...and I quote “For a god-like superhero you are really fucked up. Does this dude you’re so fixated on even know you like him? I mean shit man, you have a strange idea of courting someone, you know. Try and ask him to the movies or something. Jesus.”
Peter makes a strangled sound that is somewhere between horror and laughter. Not only is it an uncanny impersonation of the average teenager, the words are just….
Sylar turns his head to look Peter dead in the eye for the first time since the nurse arrived home.
“Would you please come to the movies with me tonight Peter?” The words are fairly innocent, the hot, syrupy suggestion in the velvet voice is anything but.
Taking a deep breath, Peter summons his courage and walks over to the couch. Seeing his approach, Sylar sits up, booted feet hit the floor; head tipping back, hands open on his knees. Peter gently trails the back of his fingers down the smooth, handsome face before him from temple to jaw. He watches in stunned comprehension as Gabriel’s breath catches, his eyes flutter shut, the long throat issues what can only be described as a moan.
“This is a really, really bad idea.” Peter’s voice sounds alien to his own ears. Despite his words, his fingers continue to explore, tracing the strong brows and neat nose, long inky lashes and lovely mouth. Gabriel arches like a cat, pushing into Peter’s caress, searching for more while his own hands remain still.
“I know,” Sylar agrees, eyes closed. “Why do you think I force myself to stay away? I get to day six and then I have to come back.” A long low sigh. “I should just kill you.”
Peter brings his other hand up to steady himself on one broad shoulder.
“Please don’t.”
“Okay.” Instant agreement and suddenly Peter feels something within him shift. The battle he’s been fighting against this attraction has ended, a white flag of surrender offered. He wants this, wants this man and god help him…damn the consequences. Because boy, will there be consequences.
Leaning down, Peter presses his lips to Gabriel’s in a light, chaste kiss.
“Just to let you know, I don’t get naked on a first date.” He murmurs against the other’s mouth.
Lids fly open and midnight orbs look up into his, shock and joy waring with hilarious disappointment.
“Oh yes you do.” Strong hands catch Peter at the hips and pull him forward until the slighter man straddles Sylar’s lap. Wriggling forward until he can press his hard cock against Sylar’s, Peter let’s his knees sink deep into the couch cushions on either side of them and takes another nipping kiss.
“You’re right,” Peter agrees as he pulls his shirt over his head and drops it onto the floor behind him. “I really do.” Nimble fingers undo shirt buttons with incredible skill as citrus flavoured telekinesis joyfully unzips pants and unlaces shoes.
Sudden pain and Sylar’s long fingers grip Peter’s hips, nails digging in with iron control. Leaning his forehead against Peter’s collar bone, Sylar’s voice sounds like someone ground gravel into the velvet.
“I don’t know if I can… I need to…” there is both threat and desperate need in the words.
Holding still, Peter draws another white flag from within and offers it freely.
“You can Gabriel, I want you to…” his hands tug non-too gently at the thick hair. “Anything you want, it’s fine.”
With permission sought and granted, Sylar finally takes the lead.
They kiss like they've been lovers for a decade or more. Straight past the fumbling of a first time and well into 'I know what you like' territory. The press of Gabriel’s lips and the hot, push of his tongue finds Peter sighing, opening his mouth and letting Gabriel in. The sudden sweetness of it makes his heart ache. Inching even impossibly closer, Peter tries to occupy the same place in time and space as Gabriel, his body reacting to the instinct of passion and politely taking his mind along for the ride. Kissing the hot, sensual mouth back with the hunger he'd so easily surrendered, their tongues fight not for domination but to determine who could explore the other's mouth more hungrily.
Kisses that send shivers up Peter spine, greedy wicked hands that seem intent on touching every inch of his skin and bringing him to aching arousal. The shivers stop completely when Gabriel’s power tears their clothes into confetti and a long, nimble tongue laps at small beads of sweat collecting at the base of Peter’s throat.
Surrendering control, Peter offers only a passionate ‘yessss, yesss’ as he is manhandled over onto the couch with his forearms braced on the side. Spreading his legs in blatant invitation, Peter arches his spine into the touch of Gabriel’s mouth at his tailbone, a full-body shiver giving away any pretence he might have had of self-control. Head dipping in pleasure as Gabriel reaches beneath him to encircle his cock, palming the shaft and rubbing intently at the swollen head.
Peter’s brain thinks of trying to return the caress, but his flesh is another matter, it replies to Gabriel's hands and skin with a full body shudder and a needy thrust of his hips into that stroking touch. It occurs to him that this is really happening. He is actually here on his couch about to have what he is sure will be really amazing sex with Gabriel Grey. Mentally pleading that he isn't about to wake up sticky and broken-hearted, Peter’s lips curl into a lazy, sex-infused smile.
Then an intimate caress of both power and fingers and Peter relaxes into the sensation as Gabriel opens his body, stretching and twisting until he is panting with need.
"-Yes-" Peter's eyes almost close as Gabriel's fingers breach his body, the slippery silk of the touch sending his head forward once again to rest drunkenly on the cloth beneath him. A shift and play of long lean muscles behind him and Peter takes a long, deep breath.
The touch, the sensation of hard, swollen flash against his needy opening is too much of a temptation. Hands going white knuckled on the fabric beneath them, Peter nearly begs. Oh, he wants this. Wants Gabriel inside him so badly it feels like he is going to scream if he isn't taken, and taken fast.
Sylar responds to the desperation coming from Peter’s skin and with a hard, guttural sound pushes his long shaft deep into Peter in one controlled thrust. For a single teardrop moment, they hold still, both awash with the all-encompassing feeling of being possessed and possession.
Then Gabriel begins to move.
After that, for Peter everything begins to boil down to fleeting snatches of sensation. The pad of his Gabriel's thumb running over his left hipbone, the hot wisp of air behind the delicate shell of his ear raising goose bumps on his forearms, the hard, lean body rocking relentlessly into his. As Gabriel thrusts into him, over and over, Peter's body is pulled back and forth against his braced arms, knees bending so that he can push back and take even more, feel all of it, down to his soul.
And he keeps talking. Deadly, heart-breaking words that fuck Peter’s brain as his cock owns Peter’s body.
“Perfect…yes…only you…in my head all the time…beautiful…mine…Peter…only one…only you…love...”
The clench of desperate hands across the top of his thighs and Peter knows he is close. Gabriel is giving him everything in him, his passion, his voice and his magnificent cock bringing Peter up a high, blissful mountain. Tearing his hand from its ferocious grip on the couch, Peter strokes himself in time with his partner's thrusts, occasionally rasping the back of his fingers on the woven cloth. The small pain only serves to contrast with the brilliance taking place behind him.
The apartment is gone, the world gone; all that is left is Gabriel and the mountain disappearing out from under Peter.
A warm, pleasured scream curls up through Peter's lungs and is ready to burst from his lips. He is peripherally aware of the couch pounding over and over into the floor, but is too lost in the intense wash of electricity flooding through him to try and stifle his shout of ecstasy. Strong fingers now in his hair, mirrors to the pulsing heat invading and spiraling his body, pull his face around and Peter’s lips are smothered by the hot, sweet press of his lover's mouth. Gabriel is kissing him, fucking him, loving him. All around Peter, their bodies locked intimately together while he crests the barreling waves of climax sweeping through him. Intense. Mind-blowing.
For a fraction of an instant all is blinding white.
*****
Saturday morning.
Peter wakes with his head pillowed on a strongly muscled thigh and long fingers playing gently in his hair.
Blinking sleepily he watches as Gabriel changes the station of the television using telekinesis.
“Why would I want to cook something that looks like vomit? Stupid woman.”
The cooking show disappears.
“I don’t think he’s being faithful to you Jodie because that’s your sister backstage looking nervous”
The talk show stays on for nearly thirty seconds before being axed.
“Children wouldn’t understand this anymore than I do.”
The commentary is witty, vicious and brutally funny. The fingers that stroke his body are loving.
Smiling, Peter curls in closer and enjoys a sleep-in.
-END-